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Wednesday, 7 September 2011

Experimental glass buttons from the Sixties

These buttons are from the Sixties, I have a soft spot for this era as I was a child and interested in my father's work, when the Sixties ended I was sixteen and by that time more interested in myself.

The buttons are really experiments, he is seeing what he can make. They are probably made in the longueurs of summer when he would put the furnace on to make samples and have a bit of a play. In the summer he worried whether he would get enough orders to stave off an overdraft the next year. In the summer he created the samples to go with the snippets of material sent to him for the coats and suit designs for the Winter Season.

BUTTON ONE He bought his paints from Johnston Matthey by post, if he saw something new he thought he could use he sent for a sample. He sent for some crackle glaze which you sprinkled on and it looked like glass dust fused to the surface. He's tried this on clear glass with a gold painted vertical slice. Not impressed, he ground the face of the button so you get fragments of shine from the crackle and the gold on an otherwise mat surface.

BUTTON TWO For this he used a piece of rod glass which he was always trying to work out how to use. He watched the glass makers who made glass rod animals and bought some glass to see if he could use it. He never really found the answer but this is him trying to use it.

BUTTON THREE This is clear glass with the colour painted onto the back. I think there must have been problems as there are very few of these but its a really pleasing result like little paper weights.

BUTTON FOUR He's made this by grinding across the face of the button

BUTTON FIVE This is lovely, it was probably made as a pendant piece. Its a clear glass sandwich with a filling of sprinkled paint pigment. The air bubbles would be accidental but add to its interest.

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I run Nichols Buttons which sells the extraordinary glass buttons made by my father L.Nichols.
I also write Handmade Lives a Wordpress blog which aims to help craftspeople make a better living.
http://handmadelives.wordpress.com/